It's not exactly easy to write a blog. You feel as if you have to say something brilliant and interesting every time. Not too many people are going to care that "I had a bowl of corn flakes for breakfast." Thus, I appreciate questions that are posted on the blog or e-mailed directly to me. One thing sparks another and before you know it you've got something brilliant and interesting. Anyway, all that to say that I was asked "what is the weather like over there?" So here is more than you probably ever wanted to know.
Last week on Tuesday we celebrated Autumnal Equinox Day. It is a national holiday and thus we had a day off from school. It also marks a very important day in Japanese weather. Before that day, summer outfits are worn. For example, the school I walk past every morning wore blue shirts and white sailor hats (how's that for a school dress code). The girls were in skirts and had a neckerchief around their neck - like a girl scout uniform. The boys wore ties and carried a little satchel. Anyway, after Autumnal equinox day, the uniform changed. The white sailor caps on the girls were replaced with raspberry berets. The boys now wear a round, flat military looking hat and they all wear a navy blue, wool jacket. The temperature or actual weather doesn't seem to matter. That is the day that uniforms change from summer to winter. All that being said, it was uncanny how the weather changed. Before that day we hardly had a time when the temperature dropped below 30 (that's 86 for you Americans) along with high humidity. Near Equinox Day a typhoon came near us. It didn't do much damage and didn't even bring much rain but it sucked the heat out of the area though the humidity has remained. :( For example, in the last week, the temperature has not gotten above 24 (75 for the Americans) and yesterday the high temperature was only 17 (64 again for the Americans). It was a huge change and amazingly it corresponded exactly with Autumnal Equinox Day. I'm told that is not usually the case - but it was this year.
Weather, for the most part has little effect on the Japanese. Many people walk, ride bikes or scooters or work outdoors. If it rains, even quite hard, many people walk, ride bikes or scooters or work outdoors. It's just that in the rain, everyone has an umbrella.
Back to the question - what is the weather like here? It's not all that different from North Carolina. Hazy, hot and humid summers and it looks like we're setting up to have a beautiful, spectacular fall.
Cheers
Tuesday, September 30, 2008
Monday, September 29, 2008
The Stoic Japanese
I have been asked if the Japanese show any emotion. I think the idea that they don't show emotion must come from old samurai movies where they carry on no matter the personal cost but in reality nothing could be further from the truth. The Japanese are a highly emotional people. I'm not sure of the olympic coverage you got to see, but in Japan, the Japanese athletes would cry when they won, they would cry when they lost, they would cry when they had to withdraw from injury, they would cry again when they talked to reporters. The Japanese also have a very developed sense of humor. You will often see them laughing, playing, telling jokes and generally enjoying life. The arts are also very popular here. They avidly participate and watch traditional Japanese music, dance and theater. However, they have completely adopted western styles as well with rock, pop and classical music, a wide variety of theater and opera and even their own professional wrestling circuit.
The one thing the Japanese do that may give the impression of emotionless-ness - they are extremely disciplined. There is no excuse for lack of effort or for not following directions to the letter. If you are told to touch your toes 100 times you will do it 100 times without question. In fact you will do whatever the coach asks almost without question. In fact, for many, that is their approach to mathematics as well. Drill and practice, kill and drill. Why do only 5 problems when you can do 100. Still, once the practice is over they are quickly back to their playful selves.
Despite the stereotypes - I would never describe the Japanese as stoic.
The one thing the Japanese do that may give the impression of emotionless-ness - they are extremely disciplined. There is no excuse for lack of effort or for not following directions to the letter. If you are told to touch your toes 100 times you will do it 100 times without question. In fact you will do whatever the coach asks almost without question. In fact, for many, that is their approach to mathematics as well. Drill and practice, kill and drill. Why do only 5 problems when you can do 100. Still, once the practice is over they are quickly back to their playful selves.
Despite the stereotypes - I would never describe the Japanese as stoic.
Monday, September 8, 2008
Osaka City
I finally had a chance to spend a day downtown in Osaka City. Osaka has a bit of a reputation in Japan. It is thought of as the wild west, where life is a bit rougher, the people are a bit more aggressive and the life is more free. Of course, you have to keep in mind that this is only relative to the rest of Japan. Most Westerners are amazed at how clean, organized, careful, reserved and lawful everything is. The other thing Osaka is known for, is the food. The variety and quality is truly astounding.
My day in Osaka was spent primarily in the northern center called Umeda. The southern center is called Namba (I think), but I haven't gotten there yet. I took a train there and it dropped me off at Osaka Station which makes Grand Central Station look like nothing. The Hankyu lines end here (about 15 tracks), The Hanshin line ends here (another 15 tracks) and then at least three subway lines have stations here. There is an underground city here complete with miles of mall type shops and levels and levels of the underground. I got thoroughly lost wandering around so I made my way to the surface where there are more people, more shops and more restaurants. I came up near the Hankyu Entertainment Center which I had to check out. Inside the first thing I saw was a full sized blue whale (though this one was red) hanging from the ceiling. Inside was basically a mall with a couple of interesting extras - on the seventh floor I found a giant ferris wheel, sort of like the one in London except this one starts inside a building, near the top of the mall. I had to ride it! What a hoot. So I got some good panoramic shots of Osaka from the top of the ferris wheel on top of the building. The other thing that was a little different, also on the seventh floor, was the entrance to Sega Joyopolis. The signs and pictures made this look like a full blown amusement park with numerous rides and attractions. The only problem was, I knew there wasn't enough room for a roller coaster, a safari ride or whitewater rafting. I had been up in the ferris wheel and knew there were only at most two floors to fit all this stuff. What I finally figured out is that the whole thing is a virtual amusement park. For example, you might sit in a car and they will project the 360 degree view, blow wind through your hair, bounce your car around and even spray you with water. So even though you never moved, you have experienced a safari ride. And the whole Joyopolis was like this. What a riot!
After that I headed over to Osaka Castle. This is the symbol of the city and is very cool! Of course the original was firebombed in World War 2 so this is a replica, but it is still pretty impressive - although I bet the elevator and air conditioning were added in. Anyway there is a huge outer moat, an equally impressive inner moat and then the fabulous castle itself. Perhaps the best thing was I found that they sold Slurpees. After spending a few hours wandering around the castle, the grounds and the gardens, I made my way back to Umeda and spent more time exploring and what to my wondering eyes should appear: an Outback Steakhouse. I know it doesn't seem exciting to you but for me it was marvelous. So I ate dinner there and then slowly made my way home taking in the sights, sounds and smells of the city. There is still a lot more to see, so I look forward to heading downtown for more!
My day in Osaka was spent primarily in the northern center called Umeda. The southern center is called Namba (I think), but I haven't gotten there yet. I took a train there and it dropped me off at Osaka Station which makes Grand Central Station look like nothing. The Hankyu lines end here (about 15 tracks), The Hanshin line ends here (another 15 tracks) and then at least three subway lines have stations here. There is an underground city here complete with miles of mall type shops and levels and levels of the underground. I got thoroughly lost wandering around so I made my way to the surface where there are more people, more shops and more restaurants. I came up near the Hankyu Entertainment Center which I had to check out. Inside the first thing I saw was a full sized blue whale (though this one was red) hanging from the ceiling. Inside was basically a mall with a couple of interesting extras - on the seventh floor I found a giant ferris wheel, sort of like the one in London except this one starts inside a building, near the top of the mall. I had to ride it! What a hoot. So I got some good panoramic shots of Osaka from the top of the ferris wheel on top of the building. The other thing that was a little different, also on the seventh floor, was the entrance to Sega Joyopolis. The signs and pictures made this look like a full blown amusement park with numerous rides and attractions. The only problem was, I knew there wasn't enough room for a roller coaster, a safari ride or whitewater rafting. I had been up in the ferris wheel and knew there were only at most two floors to fit all this stuff. What I finally figured out is that the whole thing is a virtual amusement park. For example, you might sit in a car and they will project the 360 degree view, blow wind through your hair, bounce your car around and even spray you with water. So even though you never moved, you have experienced a safari ride. And the whole Joyopolis was like this. What a riot!
After that I headed over to Osaka Castle. This is the symbol of the city and is very cool! Of course the original was firebombed in World War 2 so this is a replica, but it is still pretty impressive - although I bet the elevator and air conditioning were added in. Anyway there is a huge outer moat, an equally impressive inner moat and then the fabulous castle itself. Perhaps the best thing was I found that they sold Slurpees. After spending a few hours wandering around the castle, the grounds and the gardens, I made my way back to Umeda and spent more time exploring and what to my wondering eyes should appear: an Outback Steakhouse. I know it doesn't seem exciting to you but for me it was marvelous. So I ate dinner there and then slowly made my way home taking in the sights, sounds and smells of the city. There is still a lot more to see, so I look forward to heading downtown for more!
Wednesday, September 3, 2008
Classes
I have had classes for 6 days now and I am starting to get a feel for them - so here are my insights after such a short time.
First the teaching requirements. I teach 4 classes - math 9, math 10, Math Standard Level and Math Higher Level. so four classes but two only meet 4 days a week so my teaching load is 18 hours per week. I have to be at school from 8:00 - 4:30 every day and there is no dress code really. So faculty can where t-shirts, jeans or shorts. I find that most of the time I dress up a little - except for Fridays. In addition, all faculty have to do something outside of class. So I have been volunteered to help coach middle school boys basketball. Luckily I am the assistant coach :)
IB Curriculum. IB uses an integrated approach to mathematics. So one day you might be doing geometry, the next day calculus and the next day statistics. I have mixed feelings about this so far. On the positive side, it keeps students and teachers on their toes as you are always moving from one topic to another. It makes it easy to make connections and review previous topics. It makes it fun to teach. On the negative side is that it seems to lack depth (at least from what I can tell right now). For example, in the US curriculum we would spend two weeks or more looking at limits and different ways to use them. In the IB curriculum we barely acknowledge them as we jump into derivatives. Do you really need to know the limit rules in order to take derivatives? Maybe the US curriculum tries to do too much. I'm still trying to figure that part out.
The classes: Math 9 consists of 20 students of all levels, interests and abilities. Luckily math is highly valued in Asian cultures so most of the kids with at least one Asian parent are pushed to excel. Still I am finding it interesting to try to teach numerous subjects to numerous levels. For example two days ago I taught creating equations from word problems, yesterday and today it was rates and tomorrow it is measures of center for data sets. All in all it keeps me scheming how to approach these in an interesting style.
Math 10 is very similar to math 9 in terms of a diversity of topics and abilities of the students. 23 are in this class. We have been mainly reviewing so far but have just started graphing inequalities. In the next day or two we will look at making sense of data, particularly large data sets. All very interesting.
For IB purposes, 9th and 10th grade are still part of the Middle Years Program and as such put together a portfolio of key pieces of work. They must also do a research topic on anything they choose and every faculty is involved as an advisor to some students. Right now I only have one that compares Japanese baseball to American baseball. I should learn a few things. For 11th grade students, they have their first and only choice as far as math is concerned. They can either take mathematical studies, math standard level or math higher level. Math studies and math SL are each taught as a one year class here though I understand it is a two year class most other places.
Math SL I may be taking this slightly out of context, but last spring when students were selecting their courses they were under the impression that my predecessor would be teaching SL and HL. He did not have a very good reputation as far as his teaching ability was concerned so more than a few of the students opted out for math studies, which is taught by another teacher. Thus my SL class has only 5 students. These tend to be the bright kids who like math and with such a small group I can really push them. Right now we are doing calculus derivatives. Next week we hit integrals then it's on to sequences and series.
Math HL is a two year sequence, doing all of the SL topics and more depth and breadth. This class consists of 1 student!It is like a one on one tutorial 4 days a week. We have hit trigonometry, polynomials and quadratics already.
Both the SL and HL class lead to the IB diploma. There are 6 areas of study and at least 3 have to be Higher Level. This year's seniors (except for one) have all chosen to take HL in other areas. The way they pass the course is based on 2 portfolio pieces - this counts for 20% of their overall grade. 80% of the grade is decided by a high stakes test in May. The test lasts two days for each subject and covers the whole year.
Me. This is my first time teaching in an IB program. Thus I am still getting used to the program, the curriculum and the acronyms. Upon hearing about the curriculum I was under the understanding that these were just amazing students who had to cover a huge amount of material. After being in it for a week, I have revised my view. For the most part these are good/average students. There are some hot shots and some who need extra help. There is a lot of material but it is in bite-sized pieces, easy to cover in a couple of days. I'm sure my views and opinions will change over the next few days, weeks and months but right now this is my best take on it all.
Cheers
First the teaching requirements. I teach 4 classes - math 9, math 10, Math Standard Level and Math Higher Level. so four classes but two only meet 4 days a week so my teaching load is 18 hours per week. I have to be at school from 8:00 - 4:30 every day and there is no dress code really. So faculty can where t-shirts, jeans or shorts. I find that most of the time I dress up a little - except for Fridays. In addition, all faculty have to do something outside of class. So I have been volunteered to help coach middle school boys basketball. Luckily I am the assistant coach :)
IB Curriculum. IB uses an integrated approach to mathematics. So one day you might be doing geometry, the next day calculus and the next day statistics. I have mixed feelings about this so far. On the positive side, it keeps students and teachers on their toes as you are always moving from one topic to another. It makes it easy to make connections and review previous topics. It makes it fun to teach. On the negative side is that it seems to lack depth (at least from what I can tell right now). For example, in the US curriculum we would spend two weeks or more looking at limits and different ways to use them. In the IB curriculum we barely acknowledge them as we jump into derivatives. Do you really need to know the limit rules in order to take derivatives? Maybe the US curriculum tries to do too much. I'm still trying to figure that part out.
The classes: Math 9 consists of 20 students of all levels, interests and abilities. Luckily math is highly valued in Asian cultures so most of the kids with at least one Asian parent are pushed to excel. Still I am finding it interesting to try to teach numerous subjects to numerous levels. For example two days ago I taught creating equations from word problems, yesterday and today it was rates and tomorrow it is measures of center for data sets. All in all it keeps me scheming how to approach these in an interesting style.
Math 10 is very similar to math 9 in terms of a diversity of topics and abilities of the students. 23 are in this class. We have been mainly reviewing so far but have just started graphing inequalities. In the next day or two we will look at making sense of data, particularly large data sets. All very interesting.
For IB purposes, 9th and 10th grade are still part of the Middle Years Program and as such put together a portfolio of key pieces of work. They must also do a research topic on anything they choose and every faculty is involved as an advisor to some students. Right now I only have one that compares Japanese baseball to American baseball. I should learn a few things. For 11th grade students, they have their first and only choice as far as math is concerned. They can either take mathematical studies, math standard level or math higher level. Math studies and math SL are each taught as a one year class here though I understand it is a two year class most other places.
Math SL I may be taking this slightly out of context, but last spring when students were selecting their courses they were under the impression that my predecessor would be teaching SL and HL. He did not have a very good reputation as far as his teaching ability was concerned so more than a few of the students opted out for math studies, which is taught by another teacher. Thus my SL class has only 5 students. These tend to be the bright kids who like math and with such a small group I can really push them. Right now we are doing calculus derivatives. Next week we hit integrals then it's on to sequences and series.
Math HL is a two year sequence, doing all of the SL topics and more depth and breadth. This class consists of 1 student!It is like a one on one tutorial 4 days a week. We have hit trigonometry, polynomials and quadratics already.
Both the SL and HL class lead to the IB diploma. There are 6 areas of study and at least 3 have to be Higher Level. This year's seniors (except for one) have all chosen to take HL in other areas. The way they pass the course is based on 2 portfolio pieces - this counts for 20% of their overall grade. 80% of the grade is decided by a high stakes test in May. The test lasts two days for each subject and covers the whole year.
Me. This is my first time teaching in an IB program. Thus I am still getting used to the program, the curriculum and the acronyms. Upon hearing about the curriculum I was under the understanding that these were just amazing students who had to cover a huge amount of material. After being in it for a week, I have revised my view. For the most part these are good/average students. There are some hot shots and some who need extra help. There is a lot of material but it is in bite-sized pieces, easy to cover in a couple of days. I'm sure my views and opinions will change over the next few days, weeks and months but right now this is my best take on it all.
Cheers
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